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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26128495">Fluff</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/NumptyPylon/pseuds/NumptyPylon'>NumptyPylon</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Dragon Prince (Cartoon)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Aanya-centric, Childhood Memories, Flashbacks, Fluff, Gen</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-26</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 09:08:46</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>984</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26128495</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/NumptyPylon/pseuds/NumptyPylon</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Defying the weight of expectations and circumstances, the lightness, the fun, the fluff will out!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Aanya &amp; Ellis (The Dragon Prince), No Romantic Relationship(s)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>27</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Fluff</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><ul class="associations">
      <li>For <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/users/mistenflute/gifts">mistenflute</a>.</li>



    </ul></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    
<p></p><div class="center">
  <p>
    
  </p>
</div><h2>Morning</h2><p> </p><p>“It’s… fluffy?” Ellis commented, poking the white spread, seeming fascinated as it stuck to her fingers. “Really? Just… fluffy. And sweet? Nothing else?”</p><p>“No?” Aanya said, baffled. “It is fluff. That is… what is is?”</p><p>Ellis didn’t look quite convinced, but studied the white blob of fluff on her fingers in fascination. “It’s not really worms or… maybe reacts with your spit to change flavor to acidic or-”</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Aanya reached for a handful of the fluff, and it stuck to her fingers, like a sticky web when she spread them. She was meant to never eat with her hands, but only Patiya was here right now, and she never told on her. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>And Patiya smiled at her, reassuringly, like she knew what she was thinking.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Aanya smeared the fluff on top of her cheesecake like a Del Bar barbarian. Not because she expected the combination to be good, in fact she was pretty sure it wouldn’t be… but because she had to do the things she was not supposed to do while she had the chance.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It <strong>did</strong> taste weirdly good. Freedom was supremely palatable, she thought.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>Ellis didn’t care about what you were supposed to do, she put the fluff in a pile on her plate, entirely eschewing the rhubarb tartlets it was supposed to go with. And she was shaping it into a swirl with her fingers.</p><p>Then she licked her fingers.</p><p>At the table.</p><p>And put her fingers <em>back </em>in the fluff she meant to <em>eat.</em></p><p>Aanya stared in… not horror. Maybe… envy?</p><p>Ellis looked up at her, grinning widely, unashamed.</p><p>She had fluff on her nose.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<h2>Afternoon</h2><p> </p><p>Aanya drew back the bow, her back straight, her side angled against the target, like she had been taught.</p><p>The arrow found its mark, the illusion target shattering into rainbow-colored sparkles accompanied by a twinkling tune. And pride welled up inside her, because that sound was nothing she had ever heard before, no instrument in existence.</p><p>It was all Ellis, and it was amazing, making something new like that. Especially a sound like <em>that</em>, that made her inexplicably happy about hitting the target. Like a ‘pling’ that resonated inside her.</p><p>A celebratory pling.</p><p>She should… not need external validation. Knowing she had done well was reward in itself. That sound was unnecessary fluff, she knew, but-</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>The archery instructor had gone on break, leaving her to practice alone in the private courtyard.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Aanya’s time was her own, for the next thirty minutes. And Patiya was standing guard, and would only ever offer genuine encouragement when she did something flashy and impractical.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>So she did a shot behind her back. That one went wide, and by quite a lot.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Between her own legs, standing with her back to the target. It was pretty hard to aim upside down, she did not release that shot, out of consideration for the horses in the stables behind the target wall.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Sitting flat on her butt, holding the bow with her feet and drawing back with both hands and all her might. That arrow almost punched all the way through the target, which was so cool she could overlook that the bowstring smacked painfully across the top of her feet, even through her boots.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Two arrows at once. The lower connected, the top went wide, but only a bit. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>She could probably make that last one work.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>With practice.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>And it was <strong>fun </strong>practice, because she did not have to.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>She wanted to.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>It was a good pling. Wanting to hear that pling made her shooting better, she was pretty sure.</p><p>It definitely made it more fun.</p><p> </p>
<hr/><p> </p>
<h2>Evening</h2><p> </p><p>Aanya hadn’t shared a room with anyone for as long as she could remember. But Ellis had bunked down in her room, like it was a given, and now it was some sort of… sleepover.</p><p>She liked it. There were always so many things to think about when she went to sleep, but Ellis was drowning it out with a horror story told so cheerfully it was not actually scary.</p><p>And also, occasional happy bouncing. It was completely impossible to think about her speech at the upcoming Congression of Fealty with the squeak of bedsprings and accompanying delighted squeals from Ellis.</p><p>She was too old to bounce in the bed, surely? But then Aanya realized that this might be the first opportunity for her to do so. Mattresses filled with hay were not bouncy.</p><p>Aanya bounced too. She was overdue, she reckoned, as Ellis was, even if they were both too old for it.</p><p>Whatever.</p><p>She was definitely entirely too <em>young </em>for the things she did every day.</p><p>It would take a lot of bouncing to compensate for just <em>one </em>Congression of Fealty.</p><p>Besides, the beds were fluffy and bouncy, and were just going to waste un-bounced.</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>
  <em>Aanya laid back against the pillows. They were fluffy.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It was a new bed and mattress. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Fluffy. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Soft. </em>
</p><p>
  <em>Springy.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Springier than her old one, she thought, as she bounced her butt up and down in test.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Patiya was standing guard tonight. She would know what it meant and not come running if she heard the bedsprings.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Aanya climbed up one bedpost, to get some momentum as she leapt down, ricocheting off the mattress.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It was not very smart, in retrospect. She bumped her head against the bed frame. Hard.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>She inspected the bruise the next morning, arranging her hair to cover it. It was a rather ugly purple. She did not mind, really, even though it was sore and an inconvenient proof of childish behavior that a lot of people would have something to say about.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>It was her bruise. Her ill-advised decision.</em>
</p><p>
  <em>Hers.</em>
</p><p> </p><p>~</p><p> </p><p>The bed, the house, was hers.</p><p>She should damn well be allowed to bounce. And get messy fluff on her hands. And be happy about a nice, twinkly reward sound.</p><p>Duty could go fluff itself for a while.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Thanks for reading! </p><p>This is a challenge prompt in the format 1) Style, 2) Genre, 3) Trope/concept/character to include, 4) Specific item/food/word to include, and my friend Mistenflute gave me 1) Flashbacks, 2) Fluff, 3) Aanya's childhood, 4) Marshmallow fluff</p><p>It was written on mobile after midnight during my vacation, so it's not the most polished thing ever, but I hope you enjoyed :)</p><p>Readers of my main story <a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23689948/chapters/56876776">Down to Earth</a> might remember I'm sending Aanya and Ellis off to the country together, so this was also a bit of practice with that dynamic.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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